siellä ja tuolla

[AldenG]

P.S. I've always figured that was why Pennsylvania has a town named Bird-In-Hand. Or maybe it's for people who don't make it a few miles down the road to the town called Intercourse.

[Vellamo]

Kävimme tuolla, tuossa kuussa......The idea being that the moon is being pointed at by the "narrator"....

I think this has the implication that there are several moons that you have to separate from. "We visited the big one, not the small one, of our planet's two moons..." If there's no implication of a narrator pointing at the moon, then tuossa kuussa makes me think of a month rather than the moon, for some reason. Not that it makes any more sense. If there aren't several moons, you can just say kävimme kuussa. And add tuolla with a point to the moon, if that was an essential part of the story.

[AldenG]

The kuulla viisaan nuhdetta example demonstrates something else, namely how some grammatical ambiguities can only be resolved with insight into the meaning. (Not an encouraging notion for workers in programmatic translation.) A classic example is Saunotaan ensin ja syödään vasta jälkeenpäin. (or vasta sitten, as it's also said) Now I can't speak for all the sauna cultures of the world, but in Finland, at least, one of the possible meanings is matter-of-fact and the other is humorous. It's a little hard to pull that one off, in my opinion, because vocal cues would normally imply one meaning or the other.

There's another interesting choice in your tree-by-the-lake example. I left it alone because I didn't (and still don't) have enough confidence about that particular word. In fact, as far as I can tell there's nothing remarkable about järven äärellä, though when I think ääri+olosija, the first things that come to mind are pöytä, nuotio, takka, and maybe lamppu. I don't know why and I don't find anything in formal sources that would give the word any quality or aura or influence that weakens sharply with distance and thus suggests "gathering" per se, so it could be entirely my own personal neurosis. My choices for järven, which are not necessarily more common than yours, would be rannalla or vieressä. But what's most interesting about äärellä is that it seems to be one of the handful that get widely used in both sisä-and ulko-olento for the same application. Thus you see järven äärellä and järven ääressä (5x) (this latter one surprised me), pöydän äärellä and pöydän ääressä (app. equal, though I always think ääressä), nuotion äärellä and nuotion ääressä (app. equal), and takan äärellä (3x) and takan ääressä.

My approach is to try not to construct such things from pieces and rules (unless I have no alternative) but to retrieve them from the well of memory; so it's often hard for me to react, or to react correctly, to things I haven't encountered often enough, such as visiting the moon.

[Vellamo]

I must say that järven ääressä surprises me too! I would definitely use järven äärellä. But then, pöydän äärellä/ääressä and such are equally natural. Curious what one never notices about one's language... There's a slight difference in the feeling of the expressions, but I can't quite put my finger on it.

Could this be just a difference in different dialects, murre? A bit like I would use saunavihta rather than saunavasta. We do use the saying in my family, despite this. Ensin saunotaan ja sitten syödään vasta.

[Upphew]

Could this be just a difference in different dialects, murre? A bit like I would use saunavihta rather than saunavasta. We do use the saying in my family, despite this. Ensin saunotaan ja sitten syödään vasta.

So you don't swat itikka, but milk it?

[Vellamo]

I still swat itikka, but I do not call it by that name.

[j.petsku]

I must say that järven ääressä surprises me too! I would definitely use järven äärellä. But then, pöydän äärellä/ääressä and such are equally natural. Curious what one never notices about one's language... There's a slight difference in the feeling of the expressions, but I can't quite put my finger on it.[/i]

I have been similarly confused by rannalla/rannassa, which seem to be more or less interchangeable. Though it has seemed to me that rantaan and rannassa are used more often when the action is happening or moving to and from the water itself, whereas with rannalla, there are no wet feet, so to speak.

In the same vein, I have noticed that the old rule that maalla must mean "in a rural area," whereas maassa must mean "on the ground" is sometimes overturned. In the two examples I've noticed (sorry, not linkable), both feature some person swimming to shore, or kuivalle maalle. Could you also say kuivaan maahan?

Edit: With maassa, I am intentionally ignoring the possibility of countries, so I should change "must mean" to "usually means."

[EP]

Could you also say kuivaan maahan?

You would go on swimming until you are underground.

[j.petsku]

You would go on swimming until you are underground.

Figures.

I couldn't resist having a bit of fun with these "maa" case endings and the siellä/tuolla difference. I'd be interested to hear if this makes any sense at all, especially the second to last sentence :

Ankka lensi maalle ja laskeutui maahan. Sanoipas ankka, "Vaikka olen maalla ja seison maassa, en mä tiedä missä maassa olen." Sanoipas sitten joutsen, "Suomen maassa olet." "Saako tässä maassa uida?" vastas ankka. "Ei missään Suomen maassa tahansa saa, mutta siinä maassa kyllä." "Kiitos," ankka ehti sanoa pulikoidessaan tiehensä suon halki.